So-called mousse hairstyling products have become popular with the public. Such products are dispensed from aerosol cans as a pressure sensitive foam which is released upon the hair, typically after the hair is shampooed and towel dried. A mousse gives an appearance of penetration of the hair as the foam collapses and has ingredients that perform functions that are needed for the improved styling of hair. In particular, some of the purposes of these ingredients are to add body to the hair, thereby making it appear fuller on the head of the user, and to enhance the combability of the hair in order to make it more manageable. In a mousse some of the collapsed foam may be designed to be combed out of the hair during the process of styling.
Mousses are distinguished from hairsprays or hair setting sprays which are typically used during the final step in holding the set of the hair. Such hairsprays tend to form a film, with flexibility provided by plasticizers that allow the hair to have some freedom of motion. Pressurized hair spray is generally a solution of film-producing resins in an alcohol solvent, together with an appropriate propellant, usually packaged in a tin can. When sprayed on the hair, the product forms droplets of resin, which, when dry, impart support and stiffening properties to the individual hair fibers, by forming junctions between adjacent or intersecting hair fibers and thereby yielding a rigid network.
Although hair sprays may be dispensed from an air pump, it is at present not practical to dispense the mousse products other than from an aerosol can. In particular, in forming a foam, it is preferred that at least the foam-forming components of the mousse be dispersed in an aerosol vehicle prior to being dispensed. Mousses are, in general, not alcoholic solvent solutions, but contain substantial quantities of water which introduce problems of corrosion of the aerosol containers.
Despite these differences, the similarity of purpose of the hairsprays and mousses have led prior designers of mousses to include in their products the most efficacious components previously known to them from hair sprays and to neglect the interaction between the product that they were developing and the container from which it would have to be dispensed. As a result, mousses known before the present invention were extremely corrosive and had to be dispersed in relatively expensive aluminum aerosol containers.
This conventional approach has led prior designers to employ quaternary cationic materials in their mousse products to impart combability and control of flyaway of the hair due to static charge. The fact that hair tends to be negatively charged from combing possibly led to the belief that such cationic products would be necessary to adhere the product to the hair, since cationic materials are inherently positively charged.
There has been some suggestion, for hair products to be rinsed from the hair, of employing cationic polymers, but only in conjunction with specific anionic polymers and non-ionic surface-active agents. For example see U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,240,450 and 4,371,517.
The problem with the cationic materials in a mousse is that they attack the material from which the most economical containers could be made, namely, tinplated steel containers.
At present, relatively expensive aluminum cans are employed for mousse type sprays. They cost substantially more than the cost of standard, three-piece steel cans having epoxy coatings.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a mousse hair product that is adapted to be dispensed from epoxy-coated, tinplated steel aerosol containers.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a composition for a mousse hair product that avoids the corrosive effects of quaternary cationic materials on such aerosol containers.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a novel mousse product employing a long chain nonionic ester hair styling component.
It is the still further object of the present invention to provide a mousse hair product having the foregoing advantages without detracting from the hair styling properties of the mousse styling product.